The intruder suddenly darted away from M’Kenna, and made for the children again. She took a running start and leaped at him. She landed on the Uctu’s back. He tripped and fell. The orange disk tumbled out of his grasp. It bounced on the floor, seeping liquid as it went. M’Kenna was horrified. She put all her weight on the Gecko, trying to bear him down to the floor. He lashed at her with his tail, half the length of his body. Ow! That damned thing hurt! She worked a forearm underneath his throat and yanked upward. He thrashed and kicked. M’Kenna squeezed his neck between her arms. Its scaly skin rasped her own, but she didn’t dare let go. He batted at her, scratching her arm with needle-sharp claws.
She knew if she let him up he would hurt her children. But she couldn’t hold onto him forever.
“Is anyone coming?” she yelled.
“Not yet!” Nuro shouted back. “Hey, guards! Help!”
“Help!” M’Kenna added her voice.
“What’s going on here?”
Rafe appeared, holding onto the door frame with an unsteady hand. He was still disoriented because of the treatment. M’Kenna smacked the intruder’s face on the floor and shouted at her husband.
“He tried to do something to the kids!”
“What?”
His dark face a thundercloud, Rafe stumbled toward them. The Uctu growled low in his chest. His tail lashed at Rafe’s legs, knocking him sideways. Still unsteady after the habilitation therapy, Rafe tottered and fell over. He just caught himself before he fell on top of Lerin. M’Kenna scrambled to wind a leg over the offending appendage. To her horror, the tail wound back. It grabbed her leg and squeezed. M’Kenna was shocked. She didn’t know they were prehensile. She kicked at him with her free leg.
“Let me go!”
The intruder heaved up to his hands and knees. With a sinuous twist, he flipped her off his back. M’Kenna rolled underneath Dorna’s bunk. She crawled out, hitting her head on the low platform.
The Uctu made for the barred door. M’Kenna bared her teeth in a fierce smile. Now they had him! He couldn’t get out that way. She sprang up and edged toward him, knees bent in a wrestler’s crouch. Rafe made it to his feet about the same time. The two of them homed in on the intruder from both sides. It was only a pace ahead of them, trapped against the doorway.
But to her amazement, the door slid open half a meter. The Uctu slipped through. M’Kenna and Rafe dived for him. The cell slammed shut. M’Kenna and Rafe crashed into the bars. M’Kenna shot her arm through, grabbing for the baggy coverall. She got a few fingers tangled in the cloth, grabbing for a better hold. The Uctu tugged and writhed until her fingers slipped, letting him free. She screamed her frustration.
“Stop him! He’s getting away!” she yelled.
The intruder ran toward the far wall at the end of the corridor. That should have been another dead end, but it wasn’t. A panel moved aside, revealing a dark recess. The Uctu dove through it, and it closed behind him.
“What’s happening there?” the Wichus shouted.
“He got away!” M’Kenna said. “He went through the wall.”
Then, and only then, did the guards appear. Somewhere a klaxon went off, howling official outrage. A squad of eight Uctus in prison uniforms charged into the corridor, weapons leveled. They searched the corridor up and down, then assembled in front of the Coppers’ cell.
“What happened?” the officer at their head demanded.
“Someone just tried to hurt us,” M’Kenna said. “A Gecko—I mean, an Uctu in a plain worksuit.”
“Where did go?”
“Through there,” she said, pointing with her whole arm through the bars. “He just went that way!”
The guard captain spun on his boot heel, then turned back slowly to frown at her.
“No passage through the wall that place. Secure facility.”
“Are you kidding me?” M’Kenna demanded. “He just went that way! My husband and I saw him.”
Rafe stumbled forward, yawning hard. The anaesthetic must not be wearing off fast enough, but he blinked indignantly at the guards.
“My wife and I tried to catch him, captain.”
“No one there!”
“Wait a minute,” M’Kenna said, reaching in vain for the Uctu. He backed away. “Aren’t there security recordings? You can look at them. You’ll see what happened!”
The captain gave a curt sign with his left hand. Immediately two Geckos raised their long weapons and aimed them at the cell door.
“Hands up,” the captain said. “View recordings.”
M’Kenna felt a rush of relief. She put her hands in the air. So did Rafe. The cell door slid open. Two of the other guards entered and secured their hands to a second loop that fastened around their waists.
“What about our children?”
“Sleeping. Safe,” the captain said. He beckoned to them. “Come.”
M’Kenna scanned the corridor as she was marched toward a door at the far end. The dozen or so cells were arranged so the prisoners could not see one another’s doors. She looked hard at each as she went by. The Wichus from Sword Snacks looked thinner than before. Their fur was patchy, and their big, dark eyes seemed to have lost their light.
I’d hate to think I look that bad, she thought.
“You all right, M’Kenna?” Nuro asked.
“We’re fine,” she said. “We’ll get out of here, all of us.”
Apart from the backless seats that accommodated the Gecko tails, the industrial-style office into which they were shown was exactly the same as every one they had been in anywhere in the galaxy. The walls were battered at the edge of the desktop, showing that it or the previous table had been moved numerous times, revealing layered colors of paint. That was one clue that assured M’Kenna that they were planetside: no one used paint in spaceships because the particles tended to flake off and get into the ventilation system and the food recycler. How she missed the scraped and dented enamel walls of the Entertainer!
The guards made them sit down on a bench on the far side of the desk. They took up sentry positions beside them.
The Gecko chief ran a narrow, scaly hand over the control pad. Part of the wall shimmered and seemed to bulge out toward them, creating a three-dimensional image. M’Kenna realized that she was looking at the corridor in front of her cell. Eerily, she was watching herself inside the cell reading from the tablet. Another gesture, and the view changed to a video pickup somewhere inside the chamber. She could see herself from the side. Automatically, her hand flew to her hair. It was a mess! How could she not have seen that in the little mirror above their hygiene unit?
The captain pointed a skinny finger at the bottom left corner of the image.
“Time coding. Thirty minutes.” He touched the controls. The digitavid sped up, until M’Kenna’s past self was panting and tapping at the screen like Lerin playing one of his action games. “Ten.”
The woman in the recording sprang to her feet and ran out of the frame. The captain switched to another camera. It showed her and Rafe standing at the cell door, their arms through the bars. Their cries were muted but still audible.
M’Kenna strained toward the image.
“Wait a minute, where did he go?”
“Nowhere!” said the chief.
“Show me the corridor, ten minutes back. Now!”
The captain changed to the outer reference and slid the video back and forth. But at no point was the Gecko in the jumpsuit visible. M’Kenna could see the images of her and Rafe bang into the door and reach through the bars again and again, but there was no one on the other side.
“I can’t see him,” Rafe said. “How is that possible?”
“I grabbed his sleeve,” M’Kenna said. “Can’t you hear me telling my friends there was someone in the cell with us?”
The captain switched back and forth between the recordings.
“No voices here. Listen.”
M’Kenna could have torn out her untidy hair in clumps. She pleaded
with the captain.
“But he was there, at that time. Something must be wrong. Something got cut out!”
The Uctu shook his head. His dark eyes seemed sympathetic.
“Not on recording. Time codes unchangeable. Mistaken.”
“Mistaken? Then what about that orange thing? The one he was trying to hit me with?”
“What orange thing?” the guard captain asked.
“I’ll show you!” M’Kenna sprang to her feet.
She and Rafe went back to the cell accompanied by the captain and an escort of two Geckos. The children were awake now, with wide, concerned eyes. M’Kenna hugged each one tightly. Rafe gathered them all into one huge hug.
“We were worried about you,” Nona said. M’Kenna felt terrible. Who knew what they thought when they woke up to find their parents missing?
“We’re fine, honey,” M’Kenna assured her. She scanned the floor. “Have you seen a flat orange plastic thing? It’d be about the size of your palm. It’s important.”
“No. I can look.”
“Me, too,” Lerin declared.
M’Kenna got on her hands and knees near the place where she and the Gecko had scuffled. The children scrambled around on the floor to help her hunt.
“Dere, mama!” Akela announced triumphantly, pointing a chubby little finger. M’Kenna followed his glance. There it was! M’Kenna just managed to head him off before he picked it up.
Clear liquid pooled on the floor around the device. She handed over the orange object to the guards, then sopped up the liquid with a disposer cloth. Holding it gingerly between thumb and forefinger, she delivered it to the captain.
“There, I told you. Where would we get anything like that? You know every single thing we have in here.”
The guards ignored her scolding. One of them ran a sensor over the cloth, then muttered at the reading. M’Kenna vibrated with impatience.
“Well? What is it?”
“Only water. Must have dreamed.”
“I was not dreaming! I’ll let you scope me to prove I’m not lying.”
The captain shook his head. “You believe. No proof.”
M’Kenna folded her arms.
“Then I want to make a complaint! I want our lawyer here right now! I want to see the Imperium ambassador.”
The Gecko let out a burbling noise, their way of sighing. He picked up her tablet from the bunk, tapped in a command, and handed it to her.
“Fill out forms,” he said, his face a study in dejected resignation. M’Kenna knew what that meant: pages and pages and pages of questions, all designed to make her doubt herself and her story. She had to remind herself that he and the guards weren’t unreasonable people. They were doing a job that she would never have taken, not if street-sweeper, medical test subject or live-fire target were still open. She dropped onto the bunk, clutching the pad in her hands.
The guards locked them in again.
Rafe sat down gently beside her and draped his arm over her shoulders.
“Don’t be upset, honey,” he said. “It sounds like they don’t know everything about this building. We’ll catch the sneak. We’ll just have to stand watches, just like we did when the power plant on the ship started that weird brownout cycle a couple of years ago.”
M’Kenna nodded.
“I’m not upset, I’m angry! They made me feel like they were tearing my sanity away, and it’s the only thing I have left! I need it to protect all of you.” She looked up at Rafe, her eyes taking in every angle of his features. She loved the way his eyes crinkled at the corners, making the thick black lashes bunch up. She loved the rich, brown color of those eyes. She loved his strong chin and cheekbones, and even the fleshy lobes of his ears. She could hardly bear to think that at any moment he could be taken away, and they would never see each other again. She slipped her arm around his back and squeezed with all her strength. He leaned over to kiss her on the temple. For a moment she felt loved and comforted, but the sensation only made her more frustrated. They were in danger, and she couldn’t get anyone in authority to believe her.
The Wichus did, though.
“Hey, smoothskins!” Nuro bellowed, his voice booming out into the corridor. “Are you people all right?”
M’Kenna sighed.
“Yes, we’re fine. They didn’t believe me.”
“Figures. Sorry they’re such felimfets,” Nuro said.
“Huh. I know a lot of Wichu slang, but not that one. Whatever that means, I hope it’s nasty,” M’Kenna said. Her eyes met Rafe’s. His were brimming with amusement. She couldn’t help it. She smiled back.
“Lowest of the low scum,” Nuro said. “You wouldn’t even scrape your shoes. You’d just burn them instead of trying to get it off.”
“That’s about right,” she said. With a sigh she ran a finger over the tablet screen. “Well, these forms won’t fill themselves.”
“I’ll help you, honey,” Rafe said. “If you do the first hundred pages, I’ll do the next.”
“Deal.”
The humming of a hovercart grew in the hallway. M’Kenna looked up from the screen of blanks. The serene female doctor appeared at the door with her collection of vials and tubes.
“Ready?” she asked.
“For what?” M’Kenna asked, blankly. Then she remembered: the habilitation treatment. “No!”
“You’ve got to, honey,” Rafe said. “I already feel a million times better.”
“Process painless,” the doctor assured her. M’Kenna shook her head firmly.
“I can’t do it,” she said. “I can’t let my family be alone, not now.” She waved a finger in the direction of the office. “They think I’m lying about an intruder, but I’m not. We’re in danger!” She scanned the equipment on the hovercart. “Wait, you have a truth scope. Do a reading on me. That’ll prove to them I’m not lying!”
“Told already,” the doctor said, her mild face sympathetic. “If you like. But they think hallucination. In your situation, possible.”
M’Kenna felt her face growing hot with fury.
“Well, I can’t let myself go into a coma for four days. I want to see the Imperium ambassador. I’ll wait until she gets here to take the treatment.”
“Sicker!” the doctor warned.
“I know that! I’ll wait.”
Shaking her head, the doctor rolled her cart away.
* * *
The kids were fine once the habilitation treatment was back in their systems. Just fine. All of them had lost the dullness in their skins. They began to put on weight even on the limited prison food. Dorna grew a couple of centimeters in time for her third birthday. M’Kenna felt outrage. Her baby’s childhood should not be happening in a prison!
It took them a few days to get the application finished. M’Kenna sent it in with a personal letter in the Notes section begging for the ambassador to come visit them and the others as soon as possible. She followed it up with a message to the ambassador’s Infogrid file. When there was no more she could reasonably accomplish, she handed the tablet over to Rafe and curled up for a nap.
When she woke up, she felt eyes on her. She looked up. Rafe was staring down at her. He was almost shimmering with excitement.
“I was reading our messages. Why didn’t you tell me we got an official interested in our case?”
It all came back to M’Kenna. She sat up.
“I’m so sorry, honey. I forgot all about it.”
She sat up, and he settled in beside her.
“It’s from someone in the navy,” he said. “Isn’t that weird?”
“I don’t care, as long as someone listens to us!”
Over his arm, M’Kenna scanned the beginning of the message, then read through the rest of the message. She had to go over it a few times more just to absorb the contents. “I can’t believe it.”
In too many words, it expressed regret that citizens of the Imperium were put into such a perilous situation. Their situation, as those of their fell
ow pilots and their crews, had been noted.
A diplomat with ties to the Imperial family and the hierarchy of the navy was coming to Dilawe to negotiate with the Autocrat on several important issues. Among those was the severity of the penalties indicated for the crimes of which they had been accused. Over the last several years, several attempts had been made to equalize the punishments on both sides of the frontier. If the Coppers were indeed not guilty as they insisted, the Imperium would stand behind them throughout the trial and thereafter. If they were guilty, the matter for the courts to decide, the representative would do his best to intercede on their behalf regarding sentencing.
“Do their best,” M’Kenna scoffed. “I really hoped for better.”
“It’s not perfect,” Rafe said, “but what did we expect? It’s better than anyone else has offered us.” He held the pad in both hands. “It finishes with, ‘We recommend you put your confidence in the envoy. He will be coming to interview you as soon as he reaches Nacer.’ I can’t wait!” he said.
“What’s the diplomat’s name?” M’Kenna asked.
Rafe scrolled down to the end of the letter.
“He’s called Lord Thomas Innes Kinago. According to this, he’s the son of the First Space Lord. Pretty cool, huh?” He threw an arm around her shoulders and squeezed hard. M’Kenna felt such a rush of relief she wished she could throw herself at him and show her joy, but the kids, and the Geckos, and a dozen hidden video pickups, were watching. Instead, she was ready to call for the doctor to start her habilitation therapy. She could use four days’ uninterrupted sleep, and now her conscience would be clear.
“Lord Thomas Kinago!” M’Kenna crowed. “Let’s look at his Infogrid file. I want to send him a personal message.”
Rafe brought it up.
The image in a little frame at the top showed a portrait of a handsome young man with sandy brown hair, a golden complexion and bright blue-green eyes. His jaw and nose were strong but friendly. M’Kenna trusted him at once. She knew she could put her faith in those eyes and that nose. She put a finger on the screen to scroll down.
A digitavid was the next thing visible. Whoever had captured the recording was standing just on the edge of a large crowd of people surrounding a huge, ugly sculpture. A section near the center was blackened, as if it had just been sheared off.
Fortunes of the Imperium - eARC Page 22